Factors limiting optimal students’ engagement on Social Media: A study of Higher Education Institutions in Pakistan

Abstract

Limited research on Social Media (SM) marketing by Higher Education Institutes (HEIs) primarily focuses on understanding important practices followed to enhance students’ engagement on SM or its association with different branding constructs. However, there is dearth of research that can guide regarding practices negatively influencing SM based communication between HEIs and Students. This research explores these limiting factors affecting optimal students’ engagement on SM. A qualitative exploratory research methodology was adopted based on in-depth interviews and Netnography. 25 interviews were conducted and 6 months content analysis of Facebook account of selected HEIs was carried out for Netnography. The findings revealed different content and non-content factors negatively influencing students’ engagement on SM. Content related factors included poor design of SM content, lack of informality, inconsistent content posting and content posting during office hours. Whereas non-content related factors include selective platform presence, selective response to students' queries, fearful attitude towards official SM and absence of incentives for students to engage on SM. All these factors are believed to affect different stages of Customer Engagement including Connection, Interaction, Loyalty and Advocacy. Findings of this study have enabled gaining empirical knowledge regarding negative practices on SM, highlighted above, that shall be avoided to attain optimal results for SM marketing communication and learning how these practices affect different stages of students’ engagement on SM.